lun.r.004
p o s t c a r d s
2020
Summer 2020, it’s clear the pandemic is going to be a long haul, and social justice protests against police brutality and other inequities grip the nation. We yearn for some tangible connection to a world we recognize, the ubiquitous virtual meetings and social media proving inept, yet we must suppress the urge to reach out and physically connect with people. What substitutes are available? I decide to mail dozens of handmade postcards to friends, family, patrons, and people who connect with the project on social media, to share a little piece of the artistic practice that is helping me navigate the world.
Each postcard consists of a mixed media study for the next lun.r cycle on one side, with a personalized message written on the other. These usually include a quote or aphorism. From the dictionary of quotations my grandmother put in the hands of an inquisitive ten-year-old through my university studies in philosophy, I’ve always been keen on the format: a short concept that you can turn over in your mind, dissect, and analyze, to you know, prompts thoughts. The best are ambiguous enough to provide multiple perspectives in a most economical form. What these small postcard studies are beginning to map out then are visual aphorisms, prompts via still, planar representations, and the limits and possibilities therein, that arrest the viewer’s attention long enough to consider a concept related to the limitations of perception and memory when it comes to time and space. Rumi figures heavily, along with metallic inks and geometric forms.
inkjet and metallic inks on rag paper, 4.25”x5.67”
Since these were studies I wanted to be able to reference, I scanned copies for myself before putting them into the mail with stamps from the USPS Harlem Renaissance series. A selection of those scans is presented here, but the postcards themselves are no longer available.